Metagame SS OU Metagame Discussion Thread v7 (Usage Stats in post #3539)

[THKNKG]

I’m curious if anyone else has used it, but if you haven’t, I suggest giving Necrozma a try. It’s kinda staggering how hard it hits, and I’ve only tried the SD and meteor beam sets, but it has lots of other options. If you’re modest (which you should be, +speed natures are for nerds), after a meteor beam, its photon geyser (out of terrain) does almost as much as a timid Specs Lele psychic in terrain (~95-112% vs ~102-121% on the random default abomasnow in calc lol).

it also has a really solid move pool, including setup moves (autotomize, calm mind, cosmic power, dragon dance, swords dance, meteor beam), strong stab moves (photon geyser obv, psyshock, expanding force, stored power), good coverage options (knock off, earthquake, heat wave), and a healing move (it’s just moonlight, but still healing is nice... not to mention it can also use stealth rock and trick room... and gravity, I keep remembering moves this mon has

on top of that, it’s deceptively bulky, especially with its ability, being able to live stuff like a banded bisharp sucker punch from full (with no Hp investment), and sponges neutral hits super well too. Pluuuuuus, photon geyser ignoring abilities is super fun lol, let the unaware clef come in after a setup move and then they get blown away bc they forgot how the move works.

so Yeah, I have mainly used it on offensive teams, but I think it could work on balance builds too, so give it a try. If you’ve had success with it, hit me up with the details bc I wanna use it more/differently lol

 

[SLDR]

I’m curious if anyone else has used it, but if you haven’t, I suggest giving Necrozma a try. It’s kinda staggering how hard it hits, and I’ve only tried the SD and meteor beam sets, but it has lots of other options. If you’re modest (which you should be, +speed natures are for nerds), after a meteor beam, its photon geyser (out of terrain) does almost as much as a timid Specs Lele psychic in terrain (~95-112% vs ~102-121% on the random default abomasnow in calc lol).

it also has a really solid move pool, including setup moves (autotomize, calm mind, cosmic power, dragon dance, swords dance, meteor beam), strong stab moves (photon geyser obv, psyshock, expanding force, stored power), good coverage options (knock off, earthquake, heat wave), and a healing move (it’s just moonlight, but still healing is nice... not to mention it can also use stealth rock and trick room... and gravity, I keep remembering moves this mon has

on top of that, it’s deceptively bulky, especially with its ability, being able to live stuff like a banded bisharp sucker punch from full (with no Hp investment), and sponges neutral hits super well too. Pluuuuuus, photon geyser ignoring abilities is super fun lol, let the unaware clef come in after a setup move and then they get blown away bc they forgot how the move works.

so Yeah, I have mainly used it on offensive teams, but I think it could work on balance builds too, so give it a try. If you’ve had success with it, hit me up with the details bc I wanna use it more/differently lol

Necrozma @ Twisted Spoon
Ability: Prism Armor
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
- Photon Geyser
- Heat Wave
- Earth Power
- Psyshock

try this one. no-one is aware of necrozma's damage output and the psychic stab boosted by twisted spoon may be assumed to be specs. the turn after, you've destroyed their steel type: ferrothorn, heatran, melmetal, corviknight, watch them all drop. this is a phenomenal offensive partner for scarf kartana or scarf tapu lele (quite hard to double up on psychic types but the terrain boost is stupid) or anything that hates steel types. heat wave also cooks weavile 43% of the time from full hp if it tries a funny switch in. very straightforward but this fella feasts on double steel cores no matter the components. meteor beam is still pretty powerful, but this one clicks buttons turn 1 and is probably better rn, although you can still fit meteor beam in place of photon geyser or psyshock. mandibuzz is almost irrelevant nowadays anyway.

another set i've seen is dd photon geyser eq heat wave. quite interestingly, photon geyser starts as a special move but becomes physical after a boost. seems like a very tricky set to face but necrozma isn't usually allowed this much time to set up a dragon dance so i'd rather not do that, especially because it needs max speed to outpace zera and pult at +1 and every other relevant scarfer and weather abuser will still outspeed it.

some time ago, offense teams ran a stealth rock meteor beam heat wave photon geyser set, that could just slap all of the main defoggers in order to keep rocks up.

as a general tip, I personally wouldn't use setup necrozma outside of screens, even though it has prism armor, there are many strong neutral hits in the tier that can overwhelm it. set up rocks if your team requires it, but other than that just click damn buttons and tear balance cores open.

 

[remetagross]

https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen8ou-590919 (BIHI vs Chaitana, SCL week 9)

Another SCL replay where Band Weavile puts in excellent work. The field is free of rocks, and Weavile is brought in through slow U-turns and on SubRoost Kyurem twice (it's actually a half-decent offensive switchin, since Earth Power is a 3HKO). Triple Axel goes wild: it 2HKOs on the switch what seems to be a max physdef Gastrodon (it's a reliable 2HKO even if the first hit misses both times, or of the second hit misses one time, so that's a little more safe), puts SubRoost Kyurem on the back foot by far outdamaging Roost (exactly the same Triple Axel odds than for Gastrodon, and it tanks a Freeze-dry on the switch-in + Earth Power) and of course OHKOs Tornadus-T (even if any of the first two hits misses, it's a OHKO, and if the third hit or the first two hits miss, it's still a 50% roll to OHKO, meaning overall there's a 93% chance to OHKO in this situation).

Of course it then all falls on its face when Weavile manages only the 20BP hit on the CM Clefable. Oh well.

 

[Endrism]

Over the course of SSOU's reign, we've heard the same complaints over and over about Heavy Duty Boots and how it just complete negates the point of hazards. It makes mons not previously extremely viable a much better option now with the ability to ignore their weakness to the ever present stealth rocks. It single handedly destroyed Webs as an archetype, and people are even resorting to hazardless, defogless teams since hazards are negated by HDB anyways. So here's a question.

What is your guys opinions on Item Clause?
Item Clause being one of the primary rules in VGC formats forbidding the use of 2 of the same item on one team.

Although it's controversial due to OU never having an item clause before, I believe it would be very healthy on the metagame and allow more variety into teambuilding.

Heavy Duty Boots wouldn't really get nerfed as it would still stop your Volcarona from taking damage, but now you cant use that on any other mon causing you to think outside the box for your other mons like Blissey for example, but it will still do it's job. It would allow hazards to be in a better place without outright banning HDB as banning HDB would instantly destroy mons like Volcarona, Weavile, and others who need HDB to survive in OU.

Along with the HDB argument, forcing 1 of each Choice Item would make sets like Twisted Spoon Lele, Spell Tag Pult, Miracle Seed Rilla, and even Mystic Water Splashifu more usable and prevalent. Hell I think all the type-based boost items would be much more effective and abundant.

Pinch berries could jump into the meta, as we already see them with Colbur Berry Slowbro and even some Yache Berry Garchomps. Being able to eat a hit from something that normally KO's you is a lot more important than I think people give it credit.

Items that previously fell into being almost useless strike a few examples would be useful again for extra damage like Life Orb and Expert Belt.

Even Eject Pack and Red Card could rise in popularity as with only one leftovers in play you need to find other options for utility on some defensive options. Mew already uses Red Card very efficiently to force the opponent into a mon they would not like to be out against mew allowing Mew to set up more hazards or status something by surprise. Eject Pack being a very underrated item imo allowing things like Lando-T to suddenly swap into Magnezone or Weavile when Corv or Torn defogs, completely turning around the momentum of the match.

Health recovering berries allowing mons to live a second hit from something it normally couldn't could make surprise KO's to completely shake up an entire match, and would be an option to consider.

The amount of sheer variety of items that could be used in an Item Clause meta would make team building a lot more fun imo, and would take those items that are almost required, and force you to think outside the box since that item is already used by someone else, and I hope some of you consider it a possible option in the future to balance out the extremely spammed items and help the items lost to time.

 

[remetagross]

Fairly interesting idea. In keeping with the HDB-less tournament, why not throw a tournament specifically to test out the impact of such an item clause?

 

[THKNKG]

I don’t have a strong opinion on an item clause, but I feel one thing that would make me hesitant is how much easier (or at least, how much less variance in) prediction could become. For example, you see a volcarona and a zapdos, so you know that the volc is probably boots, which means the zap is either X or Y, and if it’s X or Y, the lando is probably Z, etc. So perhaps initially at preview you could have a good deal of variety and mystery, but with a limit of 1 item, I feel like it becomes progressively more predictable each turn. Not sure that’s necessarily a bad thing, but my gut response is that I wouldn’t like it as much. There doesn’t seem to be a need to arbitrarily limit items, since an easier course of action would be to remove ones that were too much (were that to arise as an issue).

on the other end, I’m also not a huge fan of when circumstances produce a “right” answer, and anything else is suboptimal... which is what happens with items since certain ones are clearly better. But, at the same time, that sort of optimality issue is inherent within the tiering format itself - for example, can you make a reasonably competitive team without lando/Ferro/tapu/tran/chomp/bird defogger/etc.? I’d say by not having at least one of the “optimal” meta choices, you’re handicapping your team building from the start. I’m not a fan of that either, but as it is, it’s kinda inherent within the system. Metas produce their own versions of optimality, but usage based tiering takes it a step further.

kinda a tangent, but wouldn’t it be funny if they made items tiered based on usage lol. Would be an interesting concept. But yeah, tangent aside, these are my general thoughts - not a fan of constant requirement of optimality, but also not a clean way to solve it without introducing more problems

 

[Double Electric]

Item clause is a very drastic, game-altering, and unfun rule to force on everyone out of the blue. Item clause sucks to use in six mon singles--no one wants to artificially gimp half the sets on their team for what is honestly a very subjective balance reason. Overall, it sounds like you're mainly just arguing to limit HDB, in which case you ought to just focus on that.

 

[Deleted User 464209]

I see no reason to have an item clause. The only items that even get run on more than 3 things on a team are heavy-duty boots or leftovers, so an item clause I just see as a misguided attempt at solving this "problem".

If anything, the relative prevalence of heavy-duty boots points out how dominant and hard to punish pivot move spam is. The sequence of fast pivot --> slow pivot --> breaker is skillless and puts all risk on the target. I'd look at u-turn (and the more easily contained volt switch) as the primary issue. That said, this playstyle is core to SS OU at this point, so I don't see anything changing.

 

[THKNKG]

I see no reason to have an item clause. The only items that even get run on more than 3 things on a team are heavy-duty boots or leftovers, so an item clause I just see as a misguided attempt at solving this "problem".

If anything, the relative prevalence of heavy-duty boots points out how dominant and hard to punish pivot move spam is. The sequence of fast pivot --> slow pivot --> breaker is skillless and puts all risk on the target. I'd look at u-turn (and the more easily contained volt switch) as the primary issue. That said, this playstyle is core to SS OU at this point, so I don't see anything changing.

I have thought for a while that HDB as the issue is the wrongbplace to focus, pivot moves + whatever the broken thing is tends to be even more broken. I‘m not arguing for a pivot move ban, but at the same time, the wording on some past bans about switching is that it’s a fundamental component to play, and pivot moves upend/alter that fundamental component pretty heavily. It’s pretty darn hard to get out of the pivot vortex lol, and also makes double switches less appealing overall I feel

 

[Bakugames]

Sorry if this sounds rude, but I feel like we had the item clause discussion 3 to 4 times this year, and every time it ends with "no, we are not going to implement item clause in ou, change the topic". Even the HDB discussion has run dry multiple times already (though I remember the council doing some surveys about it? I don't know if it's back on the table though).

I think the topic of pivoting is an interesting one, and I won't claim to be all that knowledgeable on the metagame to opine, but I think at this point we have to look at other things if you are talking about bans/uncompetitiveness/etc, other than item clause

 

[Nish the Great]

I don’t really understand the point of an item clause. It limits sets and makes teambiilding less fun in order to.. what? Make suboptimal sets more viable? Smogon has never made any decisions in order to buff unviable mons/sets and never should.

 

[remetagross]

If the only problem are the boots, well the HDB less tournament hasn't really produced any great conclusions.

 

[AM]

The non HDB tour meta looked terrible from watching most of the games in that tournament. No thanks.

 

[VannAccessible]

“Hey guys! Forcing everyone to only have one of each item will increase creativity in team building!”

How?

“ ... by removing options from team building!”

Yay?

The best argument against item clause I’ve heard is how it would limit defensive team options unfairly compared to offense. Offense can get by with only one item per squad mate, but how many stall/balance teams rely on several mons having HDB, Leftovers or Rocky Helmet? Stall already struggles as an archetype, having to account for every single offensive threat to be effective. I don’t think saying “Webs Offense is dead” is a good argument to put the last nail in the coffin for Stall, especially since Trick Room and Tailwind are better niche HO archetypes than Webs ever was, not to mention Weather teams. (Personal opinion here, but Webs was never good, even pre-HDB.)

Also, why try to make the Gen 8 meta resemble the Gen 7 meta? (or 6, or 5.) If you want a hazard centric meta, go play those. It’s not like choosing not to run hazard control in this meta doesn’t have the potential to backfire.

 

[DrPumpkinz]

“Hey guys! Forcing everyone to only have one of each item will increase creativity in team building!”

How?

“ ... by removing options from team building!”

Yay?

I mean that's basically how species clause works, and that's pretty unanimously considered a good thing. In most any game, opportunity costs are what make building teams/loadouts/whatever interesting.

That said, the rest of your post is much more compelling. It's like if species clause were in a meta where there literally weren't enough viable mons to fill out a team.

 

[Verdas]

I mean that's basically how species clause works, and that's pretty unanimously considered a good thing. In most any game, opportunity costs are what make building teams/loadouts/whatever interesting.

That said, the rest of your post is much more compelling. It's like if species clause were in a meta where there literally weren't enough viable mons to fill out a team.

species clause feels a lot more necessary for obvious reasons. Item clause is kinda just a way to make gen 8 not gen 8

 

[Discharged Xurkitree]

Hello all! Just wanted to talk a bit about the recent success of Zapdos-G (or as I call it Gapdos). Here's a team I have used a lot below:

https://pokepast.es/4c43ba66e57b1808

Zapdos works really well with any and all electric types. It's matchup against Lando-T alone makes it great in this meta, but being able to take care of common mons in double-steel cores like Corviknight, Heatran (sans scarf), Melmetal, and Ferrothorn is an absolute boon. I also do like that Urshifu gets some competition for the spot of physical fighting wallbreaker, which has had fewer nominees ever since Zama-C was banned. Happy that this bird has found its time in the spotlight. Does anyone think it has potential to rise in usage and the tier list?

 

[Verdas]

Hello all! Just wanted to talk a bit about the recent success of Zapdos-G (or as I call it Gapdos). Here's a team I have used a lot below:

https://pokepast.es/4c43ba66e57b1808

Zapdos works really well with any and all electric types. It's matchup against Lando-T alone makes it great in this meta, but being able to take care of common mons in double-steel cores like Corviknight, Heatran (sans scarf), Melmetal, and Ferrothorn is an absolute boon. I also do like that Urshifu gets some competition for the spot of physical fighting wallbreaker, which has had fewer nominees ever since Zama-C was banned. Happy that this bird has found its time in the spotlight. Does anyone think it has potential to rise in usage and the tier list?

zeraora=good team. fr tho, g-zap is definitely really good rn, and i would definitely support a rise to A-

 

[Walletinspector62]

While we are talking about matchup fish mons, I thought I’d shine a little light on polteageist. In a tier where the only good dark types are offensive polteageist really shines. My personal favorite set is one with sub shell smash shadow ball and stored power, just so it has a way around blissey and can ease prediction with bisharp. Also cursed body works really well with sub as you can fish for a move to be disabled. When facing a team that is ill prepared, it can sometimes auto win on the spot. Really cool mon and I hope some of you check it out!

 

[Clone]

While we are talking about matchup fish mons, I thought I’d shine a little light on polteageist. In a tier where the only good dark types are offensive polteageist really shines. My personal favorite set is one with sub shell smash shadow ball and stored power, just so it has a way around blissey and can ease prediction with bisharp. Also cursed body works really well with sub as you can fish for a move to be disabled. When facing a team that is ill prepared, it can sometimes auto win on the spot. Really cool mon and I hope some of you check it out!

Mimikyu Stardust

 

[TheTraininator]

If we WERE to introduce/change a clause for this meta, I’d rather we institute forme clause over species clause. We’re starting to get to a point in the series thanks to regional variants where there are multiple formes of meta-relevant Pokémon which play completely differently from each other, (such as Zapdos-K and Zapdos-G), yet they can’t be used on the same team due to a really arbitrary rule. Still, this change is more one I’d like to see for personal reasons as opposed to one I think “needs to happen to improve the meta”. I don’t think an item clause or an HDB ban would really improve the meta in any meaningful way to be honest. If there is any one thing that should be looked at, it’s Kyurem, and even then I don’t personally think it should be banned, though I’m not opposed to a suspect test.

 

[IBZ]

If we WERE to introduce/change a clause for this meta, I’d rather we institute forme clause over species clause. We’re starting to get to a point in the series thanks to regional variants where there are multiple formes of meta-relevant Pokémon which play completely differently from each other, (such as Zapdos-K and Zapdos-G), yet they can’t be used on the same team due to a really arbitrary rule. Still, this change is more one I’d like to see for personal reasons as opposed to one I think “needs to happen to improve the meta”. I don’t think an item clause or an HDB ban would really improve the meta in any meaningful way to be honest. If there is any one thing that should be looked at, it’s Kyurem, and even then I don’t personally think it should be banned, though I’m not opposed to a suspect test.

I thought positively about a 'forme clause' at one point, and in regards to some regional forms like g-zap I still do think it's annoying. However there are more mons with different formes than the regional ones. There's also Arceus, Silvally, Shaymin, Dyoxys, rotom, giratina, lycanroc, and probably more that I've forgot. Species clause prevents us from using multiple of these mons through different formes as well, which I think is a good thing as many of them aren't very different and some could cause huge problems (Arceus and Silvally). With that in mind I don't see species clause going anywhere in the near future.

 

[Ehmcee]

I thought positively about a 'forme clause' at one point, and in regards to some regional forms like g-zap I still do think it's annoying. However there are more mons with different formes than the regional ones. There's also Arceus, Silvally, Shaymin, Dyoxys, rotom, giratina, lycanroc, and probably more that I've forgot. Species clause prevents us from using multiple of these mons through different formes as well, which I think is a good thing as many of them aren't very different and some could cause huge problems (Arceus and Silvally). With that in mind I don't see species clause going anywhere in the near future.

I do believe some kind of distinction can be made from pokemon that can switch between forms out of battle, and regional forms (which are basically just different pokemon, but with the same dex number), however it is a fairly arbitrary one, and dex number seems to be the most consistent way to differentiate pokemon to not allow the spamming of extremely similar mons.

 

[ausma]

I have never understood why the item clause was such a common topic. Item clauses do not solve nor do they even address any real issues with the metagame; if anything it feels to me more like an artificial attempt to invoke variety in teambuilding without really understanding what constitutes variety in teambuilding in the first place. At it's core, it's an arbitrary clause that will not accomplish anything in the grand scheme of things, and will only stagnate the metagame by completely rerouting focus on adapting to the clause as opposed to addressing anything actually meaningful. If Heavy-Duty Boots are the issue, focus on them. I for one do not see them as an issue, but that's a post for later.

I personally never had an issue with a lack of a form clause simply because it's never really shown to be relevant, and the main place it would have an impact is in a specific metagame of a specific generation (Gen 7 Ubers with Ultra Necrozma and Dusk Mane Necrozma), which obviously is not quite relevant for this discussion. It would in a vacuum be harmless since there's, on average, very little synergy between Pokemon with differing forms outside of maybe Zapdos, but it's more a question of why? It feels somewhat facetious to me as a discussion point considering it will accomplish pretty much nothing for the same reason as it would be harmless, except to a much more palpable extent than the item clause.

All of this being said, I'd prefer if we didn't talk about this here, and I would encourage this discussion to be taken to the Overused Discord instead of the metagame discussion thread. I do not think it's worth necessarily shutting down, but I personally do not see a point to this discussion and it is not really relevant to our forum in particular so I wouldn't really feel comfortable having it be a focal point of discussion in the thread. Thanks for understanding!

 

[HydreigonTheChild]

I have never understood why the item clause was such a common topic. Item clauses do not solve nor do they even address any real issues with the metagame; if anything it feels to me more like an artificial attempt to invoke variety in teambuilding without really understanding what constitutes variety in teambuilding in the first place. At it's core, it's an arbitrary clause that will not accomplish anything in the grand scheme of things, and will only stagnate the metagame by completely rerouting focus on adapting to the clause as opposed to addressing anything actually meaningful. If Heavy-Duty Boots are the issue, focus on them. I for one do not see them as an issue, but that's a post for later.

I think the case is that people hate boots spam on 4-5 pokemon, therefore making it infuriating to wear down. This is what I have heard, the item clause that people so want to prevent boots spam. But, what I have also heard is that banning boots is to extreeme or boots on its own when placed on 1-2 pokemon is not broken but it is annoying to face an entire team and just making 0 progress because nothing happens. I have never really heard another argument as to why this is the case other than "It makes certain pokemon broken like cinderace" which is the case with z-moves.